


Rest

by GorseMonster



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Ambiguous Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Ascians (Final Fantasy XIV), Chronic Illness, Chronic Pain, Comfort Reading, Hurt/Comfort, Other, POV Second Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-08
Updated: 2020-06-08
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:55:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24611863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GorseMonster/pseuds/GorseMonster
Summary: Caught in a moment of weakness, the Warrior of Light feels their illness more than their duties. Luckily the Angel of Truth is there to deliver some important ones to hear.A short comfort fic involving chronic pain/illness
Relationships: Solus zos Galvus | Emet-Selch/Warrior of Light
Comments: 3
Kudos: 72
Collections: Final Fantasy XIV - Emet-Selch x WoL Recommendations





	Rest

Every nerve in your body felt like fire. Like somebody had poured refined ceruleum on your skin and allowed it to corrode through your body until even your bones ached as if they had been stripped bare and left to dry. Muscles heaved, reluctant, cataplexic to try and stop you from moving but you were too stubborn to listen to the demands of your body.

Your sundered, mortal body.

Still, its complaints gave themselves voice as your mouth opened to cry in agony as you moved, the pain spreading from leg and back up your side until you swore even your eyelashes sizzled with the same corroding burn. One foot made contact with the floor, gritting your teeth as it shrieked its displeasure at bearing your weight, then the other. Hobbling, stuttered steps on the spot as if to try and balance...and then tumbling back onto the bed. A soft grunt of displeasure reached your ears and you stilled.

“Mmgh, hero, it is far, far too early…” followed by a snore. A soft breath of relief, having avoided waking him. You stood again, made a whole three steps forward and stumbled, knees crashing to the floor, sending a shockwave of pain through your body. You sobbed, fingers gripping the floor, trembling. You heard the snoring stop and soon a hand softly laid upon your shoulder, Emet-Selch kneeling until his face was in your periphery.

“Hero.”

He had come to know what you were like. Watching you push your body until all you could do at the end of the day was lie in bed and tremble until either the exhaustion or ever-stronger remedies rendered you unconscious. It was not sleep, such a thing implied rest. It was merely a bandage on a profusely severe wound that you would reopen again and again, for your sense of duty was far greater than your sense of self-preservation. You didn’t speak, but tried to get back to your feet; fire poured through your body and while you indeed stood, you tremored and covered your mouth to silence a sob. And still, you made your way to the dresser, slumping against it.

“ _ Hero. _ ”

No. If you allowed yourself to flex for it, if you allowed it even an inch, it would consume you entirely. Swallow you whole and leave you with nothing left.

_ But, it has already taken everything. What are you? Broken, a husk, even for one sundered like you. _

The thought is pushed to the side. Merely  _ it _ talking. Just  _ it. _

Even pulling on clothes made your skin fizz and crackle in nerves, the barely-there weight of silk close to sandpaper to your senses, a million needles spearing through skin and muscle. At some point you had started sobbing openly, movements becoming more frantic, disarrayed until you couldn’t see for tears and slowly slumped onto the floor. A firm grip pulled you up, lifting you and carrying you back to the bed.

“Please, Emet-Selch, no, I can’t. I can’t let it.”

He made a soft sound, and you heard how it strained in his throat, holding you with open palms and fingers spread to distribute pressure, carefully pouring you back onto the soft mattress. “Take some of that care for others, and give it to yourself, my dear.”

“Not letting it stop me is caring.”

His grip tightened, making you whimper before he rapidly released it, sitting next to you and drawing you into a warm, soft hold that somehow, despite even your clothes burning your skin, did not hurt. “It is not caring for yourself to run yourself so ragged you cannot walk.” His thumbs stroked across your shoulder. “Won’t you truly think of yourself, just this once?”

You were silent for a long time. You did not have an answer, you didn’t want to say you wanted, that you  _ needed _ to rest no matter how much your body begged you to stop because that was letting  _ it _ win. Your eyes flitted towards his but couldn’t quite make contact. “Why can’t you…” you trailed off, pressing your middle finger and thumb together. 

His face wrinkled in a pained expression. “If I could do that then rejoining the shards would be just as easy. This is...what the life of a sundered, mortal body is, my dear.”

“But I, this is...so much…” you didn’t want to say it. You could function like anybody else. You were doing so good at it. Today should be no different. A slight shift of your body against his made you shudder and swallow vocalised agony.

“And you should accommodate accordingly.”

“But then it would win.”

Emet-Selch sighed, dragging you halfway onto him, running fingers through your hair and shaking his head slowly. “But like this, it has already won. It has taken everything but the beat of your heart. I know this is not who, or  _ what _ you are, hero.”

You turned your head to rest it on his chest, noting the slow, leisurely pace of his heart and shallow, steady breaths. Fingers stroked along your shoulder and down your arm, and finally a sound you made was not of pain, but of contentment.

“But if you refuse to take care of yourself, I accept the duty of doing so for you. And today, the caretaker of your vessel says  _ rest. _ ”

It was different when somebody else said what you could and could not do. For you had no ability to ever say no to your obligations. Always first, your own wellbeing, your own  _ body _ simply at the bottom of the list. People saw you as a beacon, a social paragon, fearless and strong and unrelenting and  _ yet _ it was those things that Emet-Selch saw for what they were; fear and self-punishment. You could not allow yourself to stop for fear that you would never start again. You could not stop because you felt you had not yet earned the right.

Warm arms closed around you and soft lips kissed the top of your head. “You need not concern yourself with your obligations today, my dear. You may rest. Dream of a painless tomorrow.”

It was so easy, like this. So easy to  _ stop. _ So easy to finally, finally rest. All your concerns of what people would think, what people need, all the duties to do and to complete pushed somewhere off into the future. So many people expected you to always keep going, to never slow.

But for Emet-Selch, you would do almost anything.

Including stop.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this fic about half a year ago when I was struggling at one of the worst points of my own chronic illness. I know many other people are prone to ignoring the need to rest and for me, writing a fic where I felt as if I was being given permission to rest by a character I love dearly allowed me to start doing so myself.
> 
> For those of you out there who know that experience, I hope it does the same for you!


End file.
